


you're the angel on the painted glass

by blackkat



Series: Horoscope Drabbles [15]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Demigods, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-02 17:07:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17268038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackkat/pseuds/blackkat
Summary: The air hums with the force of a hundred thousand things in growth.





	you're the angel on the painted glass

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by Normal Horoscopes on Tumblr:
> 
> Gemini: Sprawling garden temples teeming with life. Doorways sealed shut by tree roots, an entire river redirected to pass through the center now flows over the aqueduct walls, carpeting the old holy carvings with moss and river grasses.

 The air hums with the force of a hundred thousand things in growth.

Naruto drags his fingers over the old carvings in the pillars, brought into sharp relief by the moss that clings to them, and the spillover from the aqueduct is cool and sharp against the muggy summer sun. He shakes the water from his hair with a laugh, ducks through the stream and out into the garden, ducks beneath the trees thickly festooned with flowering vines. Birds circle, calling, but there's an orange-gold shape in the undergrowth and Naruto doesn’t pause. He bolts through the thick greenery, verdant and wild, bursts out into an orchard left to its own devices and leaps a stand of boulders only to land, tip forward, and roll beneath the snatching claws of the temple’s guardian.

“ _Brat_!” Kurama snarls, winded.

Naruto laughs, twists back to his feet and dances out of reach, grinning at his guardian as the massive fox stalks towards him. “Can't keep up, old man?” he taunts, and Kurama snarls—

A bell rings, somewhere high up and far away, and Kurama freezes. Naruto looks for the source of the sound, and when he can't see anything immediately he grabs the branch of the closest tree and swarms up the trunk, quickly scrambling into the highest branches and squinting at the towers that are half-buried in green.

“It’s the warning bell,” he says, surprised, and leans out of the tree to look down at Kurama. “Kurama, Kurama! The warning bell is ringing!”

“I can hear it,” Kurama says, annoyed, but the way his ears fold back is angry, or maybe just worried. With Kurama, there's a fine line. “Get down here before you fall and break your neck, kit. _Again_.”

Naruto makes a face at him, but he lets himself drop, twists to land on his feet and immediately reaches for Kurama. “That was _one time_!” he protests.

“Six times,” Kurama corrects, unimpressed. “I'm keeping track. And someday I'm just not going to put you back together. Then we’ll see how you like wandering around with your head on backwards or some shit.”

“Mom would come back from heaven just to yell at you,” Naruto reminds him, and Kurama winces before he can stop himself.

“We’re _not_ talking about your mother,” he snaps. “Now get on, I want to eat an idiot archeologist.”

Naruto snickers, but he grabs Kurama’s ruff, hauls himself onto his back and locks his knees against leanly muscled sides. “Too dusty,” he says cheerfully.

Kurama snorts, conceding that with a flick of his tails. “Fine. But I'm going to make them piss themselves, wandering in here like they own the damned place.”

Naruto kind of wishes they _could_ , if only so he wouldn’t be stuck with just Kurama day in and day out. the gardens are big, but sometimes they feel _too_ big, especially when Naruto is the only thing in them that cares for a human shape most of the time. “You know where they are?” is all he asks, though, because he knows why having people wandering around is a bad idea. They might let out something that’s meant to be kept sealed.

“Yeah,” Kurama says grimly, and with a surge of muscle he bounds forward, then leaps. Long claws sink into the mossy sides of the aqueduct, and Kurama snarls in effort, launches himself up and over, and Naruto whoops, lunging forward to wrap his arms around Kurama’s neck as he hits the edge of the temple’s shortest tower, then rebounds off of it. he skims a treetop, drops through an overgrown skylight, and lands hard on the mosaic floor of the main entrance.

“Ugh,” Naruto complains, and slides off his back to thump to the floor. “ _Kurama_.”

“Get up, kit,” Kurama says uncompromisingly. He stalks forward, and as he moves, he grows. In an instant he’s as tall at the shoulder as two of Naruto standing on top of each other, and he growls, a harsh, reverberating sound that rolls through the air in warning.

Beyond the wide arch of the entrance, the sound of voices goes suddenly, starkly silent.

Naruto rolls his eyes, but scrambles to his feet and follows Kurama at a trot. Kurama gets grumpy, and he shouldn’t _really_ eat anyone—Kushina gets mad about that. It’s one of the reasons Naruto always has to be around to help chase visitors away, just so that Kurama doesn’t do it _literally_.

There's a group of people gather on the front courtyard. Explorers, Naruto thinks, because they have bags and gear and tools, and the man in the very front has the stuffy look of someone who spends too much time with books and not enough time outside. He’s currently staring at Kurama, pale eyes wide, mouth open, but Naruto's eyes slide past him, checking the other faces. Scared, all of them, and—

There's a teenage boy his age, in the very middle of the crowd.

Startled, Naruto comes to a sharp stop, sinking his hand into Kurama’s fur. “Kurama!” he hisses.

There's a growling sigh. “I _know_ ,” Kurama mutters, quiet enough that only Naruto hears it. “But they can't come in.”

“But—”

“Who are you?” the boy asks, and his dark eyes are on Naruto in return, narrowed but not angry. He pushes forward, and an older man with the same bushy dark hair tries to catch his shoulder, but he slips right underneath his hand. “How are you _controlling_ that?”

Naruto snickers amused by the very idea. “I'm not _controlling_ Kurama,” he says. “Kurama’s too grumpy to take orders from anyone but my mom.”

There's a pause, and the boy looks from Naruto to the temple and back. “Your mom?” he asks slowly. “The temple—isn't it abandoned?”

“My mom is Kushina-hime!” Naruto says proudly, because she’s _everything_ he could ever be proud of. “This is her temple.”

The stuffy dark-haired man in the front makes a noise like he’s going to faint, and Kurama rumbles a laugh at the pale faces that greet the statement. “The temple isn't open to the public,” he says threatening, “so pack up you bags and start walking back the way you came.”

The boy groans theatrically. “But we just got here,” he complains, though the words are halfhearted.

Naruto jumps on the excuse. “They can stay the night!” he says, wheeling around to grin at Kurama. “Come on, Kurama, they can stay in the entrance hall, and then they can leave in the morning!”

Kurama stares at him, eyes narrowed, but apparently Naruto's pleading face has gotten better, because he makes a sound of pure disgust. “ _Fine_ ,” he snaps, and then say more loudly, “Anyone who so much as pokes their nose out of the entrance hall gets _eaten_.”

Naruto rolls his eyes, because Kurama’s _always_ overdramatic, and darts down the stairs. At least a few people flinch away from him, but the other boy doesn’t. He just watches Naruto through half-lidded eyes, careful but not afraid as Naruto comes to a stop in front of him.

“Hey!” Naruto says, beaming at him. “I'm Naruto.”

“Shikamaru,” the other boy returns, and tugs on one of the hoops in his ears thoughtfully. “Are you really the son of a goddess?”

Naruto shrugs. “She’s a goddess, but she’s my mom, too,” he confirms. “Do you want me to show you the temple? Kurama won't mind as long as you're with me!”

Shikamaru stares at him for another long moment, then looks away, and Naruto thinks the tips of his ears turn red. “Troublesome,” he mutters, and then says, “You're sure he’s not going to eat me?”

Judging by the way Kurama is glowering, Naruto can understand the concern. “He’s actually really nice,” he says in defense, because his mom is always busy being a goddess, and Kurama is the one who raised him. “He’s just grumpy.”

Shikamaru gives him a disbelieving look, but he raises his voice and says, “Dad, I'm going to go die horribly in the mysterious jungle temple.”

The man who shares his hair makes a sound of absent acknowledgement as he checks his bag. “Have fun,” he says.

“ _Troublesome_ ,” Shikamaru mutters, but when Naruto grabs his arm and tugs him forward he follows without protest.


End file.
